re: in 2003 we never

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Just observing this team right now and what they look like, I see some glaring weaknesses

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Agreed ATL..we're looking at the same team..we have some clean up to do before comparing us to NC teams...I see our young DL outplaying upperclassmen...with the exception of Nevis

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scores are scores...

2003 Blowouts..

55-24 over Arkansas
27-3 over Alabama
49-10 over La Tech
41-6 over Miss St.
35-7 over Western Illinois
59-13 over Arizona
49-7 over UL-Monroe

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Looking at these games:

UArk blowout was payback for '02 miracle.
Bammer was starting into a 4 yr. decline.
UAz was in the last year of the Mackovic debacle, and was about on par with UDub 2008.

LTU, MSU, & ULM shouldn't even count--those teams couldn't get out of their own way back then.

Surely we wouldn't want to cite the WIU game--that was the only game I got to watch in TS that season, and the game was pretty close before LSU pulled away late.

Don't think we can begin to compare '09 to '03 for at least 8 more weeks.

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Tackling and DT play. We do not control the LOS and our tackling is horrid. Id like to see the stat for yard after contact against our

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I have seen some poor tackling from some teams ranked ahead of us as well (Ole Miss wasn't sharp against Memphis). It is early in the season. It isn't unique to LSU. Can we improve? Yes. We saw improvement between the 1st and 2nd game already.

We tend to forget poor efforts in prior seasons when the overall season was good. There were some games with poor tackling efforts in 2003 and 2007 too. I think we all remember how poorly the defense played in the 1st two games of 2005, due to Katrina, but also due to a new DC and scheme.

It also may be that our DL just isn't as good as it was in 2003 or 2007. Those were some pretty outstanding DLs. It is hard to duplicate that kind of success every year, even with a talented team like LSU.

Something that everyone forgets is that the defense that played Oklahoma was much better than the defense that opened the season in '03. It was not until Landry became a starter at safety and Kyle Williams became a starter that the defense became really dominant.They improved during the season. This defense is not going to be that good, but that does not mean that they can't be very good. We held an SEC opponent to 210 yards and 7 points. That is a good showing and was an improvement over week one. We all see problems, but we should not be stuck in the hopeless belief that most problems won't get fixed. At this point, the only rational presumption is that the defense will improve. That is what happens most years and that is what we have seen so far from this team.

FYI, the OP's numbers are dead wrong...Not that it would make to compelling of an argument even if they were correct for reasons already stated.

We held Arizona to 182 total yards, Auburn to 193 yards, Western Illinois to 208 yards, and Oklahoma to 154 Yards

Also, La Tech only had 341 yards - not 493.

See the LINK and click on the individual games for stats.